


Decimal Point

by Catwithabook



Category: Steins;Gate
Genre: F/M, Surprisingly linear
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-13
Updated: 2017-08-13
Packaged: 2018-12-14 16:26:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11786979
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Catwithabook/pseuds/Catwithabook
Summary: Life is made up of firsts. And deja vu.





	Decimal Point

**Author's Note:**

> This is a couple of years old and written for a project with a couple of other friends so please excuse any typos/tense issues.
> 
> As of 8/23/2017 the correct version of this has been uploaded because my computer is so disorganized that I uploaded an earlier version. Thanks to JMP3 for pointing out the misspelling of Kurisu's name which tipped me off.

0.000001  
It’s familiar; Kurisu’s not sure where the thought came from. But from the first dry tentative brush of lips there is something that niggles at the back of her brain, as though she’s done this before. But that is clearly impossible.  
Because really, what is she doing? He’s an idiot that she barely knows. Who claims to love her because of another life. A life she dreams every night in Technicolor detail.  
But here she is standing in the raspberry light of sunset on the edge of a highway in America kissing him for all she’s worth.  
And somehow the butterflies that have gathered in her chest don’t seem to mind.

0.000003  
They part with a jerk, an abrupt ending to what had really been a very nice kiss. She almost laughs at how wide his eyes are. As though he’s honestly surprised that she’d…  
Well he should be surprised. Shouldn’t he? She swallows.  
“I’ve dreamed about this, you know.” She says it quietly, looking away from his bug eyes and down to the dry cracked pavement. One of the knees of his pants is ripped, and she can see that his knee is still bleeding sluggishly.  
“So you’ve said.” His voice sounds wobbly. His hand on the edge of her jaw is not something that she sees coming.  
He tips her chin back up, his odd gold eyes entirely serious for once.  
“Is it still ok?”

0.000114  
It’s at that moment that they both hear the slow growl of an engine. While frantically trying to flag down their one chance at salvation—she wonders sometimes if his vocabulary is catching—they lose their chance to talk about that last quiet question.  
One borrowed cell phone and tow truck later they find themselves standing in front of the dusty, down–and-out motel once more.  
“So…” She turns to face him, feeling like she’s standing on the edge of a cliff.  
“Yeah?” He turns to face her, his eyes curious.  
“Coffee? When we get back to Japan.” She can hear the challenge in her own words, a verbal flick that sends the glove skittering into his court.  
He smiles, for once not bothering to flourish.  
“Yeah.”

0.002739  
She keeps her eyes closed for a moment when she wakes up the next morning. Her first thought is that she should get to the lab—she does technically have a job after all. She blinks her eyes open and finds herself lying in a cramped and slightly rumpled hotel bed. She gazes at the wall, striped with the early sunlight that streaks in through the chinks in the blinds. She sits up and then pauses. She is clearly not in LA. And also she is clearly not in the lab. Therefore…  
She closes her eyes again, flopping back onto the bed with a groan. What the hell was she thinking?! She can remember the sunset light, the deep pink glow as they sat on the hood of her car. She can remember the press of his lips on hers. The slightly unsettling idea that, somehow, he knows her. Knows her better than he should having spent only a few weeks exchanging emails, and of course saving her life.  
The press of lips, echoing back through her hippocampus, a glimmer of rain drenched light and desperation…  
There’s a quiet knock on her door.  
“Kurisu?” Mayuri’s voice is quiet through the cheap particle board of the door. Sighing, Kurisu removes the arm from over her eyes and pushes herself into a sitting position.  
“Ok! I’ll let Okabe know. He was getting antsy.” Mayuri’s giggle is almost infectious. Kurisu can’t quite keep the smile off her lips as she drags herself out of bed. The smile broadens when she hears Okabe’s muffled shouts of “I am not antsy!”  
Well, she supposes what’s done is done. And… he had said that he loved her, whatever that meant. At the very least this will be an interesting experiment.  
Yeah, she decides. An experiment.

0.019178  
Date. Just the word seems ominous. Especially when she’s already walked him through one—or at least feels like she has. Though she has to admit that he does clean up rather well.  
It’s only after she thinks this that she realizes that she has no idea what her brain is telling her. So far as she knows she’s never seen the man in anything other than his habitual lab coat. And trying to imagine someone crazy enough to take him out is mind boggling. Though what that says about her mental state is equally troubling.  
They have agreed to meet at the restaurant, a small hole in the wall place not too far from the ‘lab.’ One that, to her surprise, he has actually been to before. She stands at the corner staring at the place for a few moments, tugging nervously on the hem of her skirt. Damn Mayuri and her ability to manipulate people into clothing.  
Why she’d caved she didn’t know. Something about the other girl’s enthusiasm. Or at least that’s what she’ll claim. Nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that she has a wardrobe full of them that she never wears because… Well, they’re totally inappropriate lab attire. Absolutely.  
She pulls open the door and steps in out of the rain, closing her umbrella. The place is small, and simple, but clean. Somehow she expected him to drag her to the local greasy spoon or a maid café. It has a comfortable air to it, one that attracts students with their lap tops and a few gossiping house wives. It’s… nice, she decides.  
Okabe’s already claimed a small table by one of the windows. He’s not wearing his lab coat. Which surprises her for a moment. It’s like seeing a child without his security blanket. She stifles a giggle at the thought and then takes in the simple gray button down. It’s left unbuttoned at the collar and he’s stuck with his usual khaki’s for pants. His chin is resting in his hand as he stares out the window at the rain. He looks…she pauses as her brain supplies ‘normal’, because the man could never be normal. But somehow he looks less like ‘Kyōma Hōōin’ and more like the man she’s been exchanging cautious emails with.  
She walks over and clears her throat. He nearly jumps out of his chair. He stares at her for a moment and then begins to laugh. Not his mad scientist laugh but his normal full throated chuckle.  
Her hackles rise for a moment—what the hell is he laughing at! Before she remembers her own thoughts about security blankets and feels her own laughter rising.  
She carefully pulls out the chair across from him and sits, smoothing her skirt awkwardly underneath her. It was a rare enough occurrence to wear one that she was never sure that it wouldn’t get stuck somewhere uncomfortable. They sit in silence for a few moments.  
“I, I need the bathroom, I’ll be right…” his voice drifts off as he hastily scrambles back from the table and hurries to the back of the shop. She bites her lip to keep from giggling. Again. Sighing she settles into her seat and gazes idly down at the menu. She knows he’s terrible at small talk, but somehow she didn’t think that she’d send him running for the hills. She needs something to metaphorically break the ice. “Would you care for something to drink?” She glances up at the waiter who is watching her with impassive dark eyes. She turns her gaze back to the menu that Okabe had abandoned in his mad dash for the bathroom. The rose tea catches her eye. She knows that he likes plain green, when he drinks tea. She can remember him ranting about having nothing but Mayuri’s ‘flowery stuff’.  
“Yeah…” she drawls the word. A plan forming in her mind. “One cup of the Hyson Lucky Dragon and one of the rose.” The waiter nods and walks away. By the time Okabe returns there is a small cup of pale liquid sitting at his place.  
Kurisu takes a sip of her tea. He sits down hurriedly and catches the cup up like a life line. A hurried sip later and he barely manages to keep from spit-taking all over her. She feels the laughter building and at his distinctly betrayed look bursts out laughing. He stares at her. She catches her breath and then presses her own tea cup towards him, wiping her eyes as she tries to regain her composure. He takes a more cautious sip of the green tea and then blinks.  
“I did remember that Lucky Dragon is your favorite,” she says, inhaling deeply before continuing. “But… we clearly fail at small talk, so…” She trails off. He smiles then, and then chuckles softly.  
“So I guess you’re drinking this then?” He offers her his cup.  
They end up talking about String Theory. She cannot remember having enjoyed a cup of overly floral tea more.

0.082137  
They fight all the time. Or so she thought. In reality she realizes they argue, banter, harangue, and tease each other all the time.  
In their usual bickering she never feels the curling dangerous heat of anger in her gut. A sensation that wants to rip free from her control and into him. She never hears that edge to the shouted words that sharpens syllables into deadly points that pierce through her mind and sting worse than any stab wound.  
She knows him. She’s spent the last month getting to know him. They’ve been practically attached at the hip. She’s spent late nights learning his language, learning to take him on his terms and, at the same time, learning to let him take her on hers.  
She puts that knowledge to good use now, when the fight turns real. She’s not even sure what sparked this mess. Can’t remember because she’s yelling things about how he’s insane for trying to base a relationship on a dream, because that’s all it is now. They never met before a month ago. And how can he possibly expect her to believe otherwise?  
But she doesn’t stop. In a moment, she’s down the stairs and she can feel the tears coming. She has no idea where to go. Her usual haunts all seem to be too full of people and the small apartment that she’s rented for the last month feels less like home than the hotel rooms have because she hasn’t spent any time there. She’s been too busy finding her way through the head of a mysterious mad scientist.  
The first tear trickles down her cheek as she hurries through the city streets, head down trying to keep her eyes clear enough to keep from tripping.  
She finds herself in a graveyard.  
She’s not sure how she finds the place in the end, but it is quiet and simple. She stumbles to a halt underneath a tree, and sinking to her knees she gets out a half thought out apology to the long dead spread out around her before she curls in on herself and cries.  
“Kurisu?” She blinks her eyes clear and looks up into the startled and kindly worried face of Mayuri.  
Kurisu doesn’t think. She just grabs the other girl around the waist and hugs her hard. It’s probably not terribly dignified or proper, but Mayuri doesn’t seem to care. She hugs back and then sits down next to Kurisu and waits.  
She listens in a way that Kurisu has never experienced. There is something pure in the way that she almost starts crying as well when she finds out that the two of them have fought and then calmly nods as Kurisu finishes.  
“I can’t believe that I said it,” she chokes out. “He just, I don’t even remember now. But it just, he’ll never believe that I believe him now.” Mayuri doesn’t say anything for a moment.  
Then: “Yes he will. You just need to tell him that. Okarin believes in you. He’s told us all that so many times. Go apologize and tell him what you told me and he’ll believe you.” She smiles, barely there but her simple brightness lingers around the edges. “I just know it!”  
Kurisu inhales and then nods. Mayuri reaches out and takes her hand, squeezing it slightly.  
“I have to go talk to Gran now, but if you need me just call!” She turns and walks slowly down the path.  
She’s never been close to Mayuri, but somehow the girl seems incapable of telling a lie. She’s a balancing force to Okabe’s wild flights of fancy in that way. And now, just hearing Mayuri say that he believes in her makes it feel like it’s true.  
She goes back to the lab, dragging her feet, feeling like the weight of her hurtful words will drag her down through the pavement and into the earth’s core.  
Okabe’s sitting on the couch arm when she comes in. He’s wrapped around that dumb little pillow of Mayuri’s, his hair a mess of spikes. His breathing is ragged. She drags a breath into her own lungs and steps forward, her numb lips already forming the terrified and pained litany of an apology.  
He looks up at her in complete surprise, stares for a moment, and then is on his feet.  
So this is what they mean about kissing and making up, she thinks dizzily.

0.164275  
It’s odd that she’s never really thought of him as a friend until now. Even having spent nearly two months living in more or less constant contact, she really hasn’t until this moment.  
This moment of watching her father being returned to Japanese custody. She’s sitting on the couch in the ‘lab’ watching the television screen with an odd feeling of detachment. An oddly painful emptiness lingers at the center of her chest.  
He’s sitting next to her. Not saying anything, not even really touching her. She can feel a spot of warmth where his knee rests against hers but that’s about it. He just sits, waiting on her reaction, waiting for her to tell him what she needs.  
And she knows that it is because he simply cares. Yes he loves her, but it’s because he knows her. Not because of her hair or eyes or even really because of her theories. She feels a slight smile sliding along her lips as she thinks of theories.  
Her father resented her for her ability to twist the fabric of reality to suit her whims. Rintarō relishes it. And then pushes it, forcing her to rethink things again and again. He will also sit with her while she watches the latest mindlessly silly anime that has caught her heart. He will tease her about it but she knows that it’s all in fun.  
And she can easily tease him back about his stupid conspiracy theories.  
Their comfortable back and forth comes so easily that she’s almost forgotten what it was like to be the isolated girl genius of only two months ago.  
She closes her eyes for a moment and then reaches out and shuts off the TV, her father’s image shrinking down to nothing. Rintarō is watching her curiously when she turns to face him.  
“Thank you,” she says, leaning in and placing a small careful kiss to his left cheek. He blinks at her.  
“For what?” he asks.  
“For being my friend,” she replies. He gapes at her for a second and then he smiles.  
“Of course. You know—”  
She rolls her eyes and slaps a hand over his mouth cutting off the impending tirade. Then she drags him out for ice cream, makes a disgusted face at the pale blue stuff that he picks, and laughs when he manages to get a blob of it on his nose. In the end, the day is not so bad after all.

0.164383  
It always surprises her when she realizes that he is actually quite brilliant. He plays the buffoon so well most of the time with his dramatically flung lab coats and rants about the organization that is following him.  
And they might just be if they knew what his brain was capable of.  
She’s sitting on the couch, Mayuri’s Oompa pillow hugged against her chest as she watches him at the white board. He’s becoming lost in the tangled web of his thoughts, his fingers smearing characters and equations across the once blank board. To some they might seem tangentially connected at best. But somehow she’s been given a window, the Rosetta stone of their conversations.  
She can see where he’s going and feels the sudden urge to catch up. To race him towards the mental finish line just for the joy of chasing him. The joy of winning overshadowed by the companionship of a shared goal.  
She gets to her feet slowly and picks up a red pen, to contrast and compliment his blue, and steps up next to him, breaking into his rambling and adding the ending to the equation that he was in the process of writing incorrectly.  
He retaliates, slashing through constants and replacing them with variables, forcing her to look from a different angle. Blue and red blend and mingle and, somehow, red ink has gotten behind his ear.  
The moment when they get it right is one that they both know instinctually. The hypothetical ‘click’ is nearly audible in the still silent room as they both stand, pens in hand, staring at the scribbled mess of their white board for a moment.  
When he kisses her in celebration it’s like flying.

1  
It amazes her.  
That this thing has been going on for a year. That she is kneeling on his couch in the ‘lab’ checking the calendar to be sure that she is not insane or imagining things. That she’s not dreaming.  
“Christina! Come on we are going to be late for—” he jerks to a stop when he sees her staring at the calendar as though it’s an incomprehensible equation that she has to solve.It’s at that moment that his words sink in. “Where are we going?” Kurisu asks, staring at him, knowing that her confusion is written all over her face. Because, of all things, he’s wearing a suit. A nice suit, in fact. Dark with subtle pinstripes, and suddenly it clicks.  
The fact that the calendar is telling her that it has been exactly one year since they started the experiment, and his slip back into his bravado and stupid nicknames.  
“You remembered!” She yells jumping to her feet. He blinks, then nods. He shifts his posture becoming less of the mad scientist and more of himself. Though he still looks slightly tense.  
“Of course I remembered! I mean, come on, it’s not like I’m completely oblivious to the passage of time.” He smirks slightly, just a little of Kyōma showing through. “I hear that girls don’t like it when you forget anniversaries and I’d rather stay on your good side. You hit hard!” She can feel her own smile growing.  
“So where are we going?” She asks, letting her gaze slide slowly up and down his frame. The suit really does look good, she decides. And so does the slight blush that creeps into his cheeks under the weight of her stare.  
“Well,” Okabe pauses, whether for dramatic effect or to gather his thoughts, she doesn’t know. “We have reservations at that new place downtown.”  
She blinks in surprise. Neither of them are big on fancy. And the new sushi place that he’s talking about is nothing if not fancy.  
“And then I was thinking that we could—” She stops him with a single finger to his lips.  
“I think that I’d rather stay in, if that’s ok?” She can feel her nerves beginning to fizz. It’s been awhile since they’ve spent any time alone between her job and his classes. She explains this with a slight smile. He nods slowly.  
They order take out from the little noodle place down the street and spend a happy hour or so indulging in shouting at the TV through a few game shows. She watches him clean up once the TV has been switched off. He’s ditched the jacket and the tie, the collar of his shirt slipping just enough to show the edge of a collar bone. The lazy, contented slowness with which he moves through the chores of washing out their glasses and throwing away the take out containers shows off his movements in a manner that starts to gather warmth in the pit of her stomach. The fizz of desire that had started the evening deep in her bones has grown to a steady buzz.  
Kurisu pushes herself up from where she had been curled on the couch and sits, chin in hands and elbows on knees as she watches him finish with the garbage and turn to face her.  
“Are you sure you don’t want to do anything?” he asks, a little of the former nerves creeping into his voice.  
Kurisu shrugs. “Depends on what you want to do,” she says watching his eyes.  
She’s thought about sex before. Hard not to when you know someone wants you, when you can feel the way that their eyes follow you around a room. Being a (yes, she has to admit it) virgin she really has no idea what to expect. She understands the basic mechanics, yes, but she’s never been able to call up a scenario that could appease her scientist desire to know.  
She doesn’t know what he sees in her eyes, but she can feel the shift in the room’s atmosphere. Can see the way that his pupils dilate slightly. The bob of his Adam’s apple. The way that his eyes slip, just slightly, down.  
For some reason she wants to tease him about his brain being turned into pudding.  
“Kurisu…” she can tell that he’s about to ask. To confirm. To make sure that he’s not misreading her. She stands then. Because she’s suddenly sure. Not that this will last forever. Not that he will always be the constant in her life that he’s become. But that she wants to be with him here and now.  
“Yes,” she says. Stepping forward and tracing a finger along the collar bone peeking out from his collar. “Yes, I’m sure. Yes, I want to do this now. Please.” Her voice catches slightly. Because this is new, and the newness makes the comfortable edges of the room suddenly rough again.  
He nods once. And she has to ask, because he seems to be hovering somewhere between terrified and curious. She swallows, his nerves making her hesitate. “Do you want—?”  
He cuts her off with a kiss. Gentle at first, before pushing closer and cupping a hand around the back of her head.  
They spend a long time just standing there trading the kiss slowly back and forth between them. She is the first to move it further, pushing him now, slipping a hand deeper into the collar of his shirt and along the curve of his shoulder.  
Rintarō’s breath catches, before he retaliates by slipping a hand under the hem of her shirt and pressing fingers against the skin of her hip. It’s odd how warmth, like time, is relative, Kurisu thinks. How they can be roughly the same temperature and yet the points of skin on skin contact burn like splashes of boiling water. Rintarō pauses, pulling back, breath coming just slightly ragged.  
“Shall we,” he clears his throat, “shall we take this somewhere with a real bed?” He squeaks just slightly on the last word and she can’t quite suppress the giggle. He glares at her, his hand tightening nervously on her hip.  
“Let’s.” She says smiling up at him, trying to erase the scowl.  
They make their way to her apartment because in the end it is closer than his. She can’t seem to take her eyes off him, even as she fumbles with her keys and stumbles through the door. It swings shut behind them and they both stop simply staring at each other. Kurisu moves to kiss him first this time, a quick careless press of her lips to his. His hands catch her hips and pulls her to him with a jerk.  
It would be easy to say that time blurs here, or slips away from her. But it really doesn’t. She can count each kiss that it takes to make it to the bedroom. Dragging Rintarō’s belt from its belt loops seems to take an eternity, and his removal of her bra takes longer even than that—he never does quite figure out the clasp.  
She knows the mechanics, the theory, but somehow the reality is both a revelation and a disappointment. There is no real pain, only a deep stretch. She doesn’t really feel changed, just a little unstable as she braces hands against his chest. Rintarō watches her shift above him, his hands resting carefully, neutrally on her waist. She can name the cocktail of neurotransmitters to blame for the dilated pupils, flushed cheeks and erect penis between her legs but she can’t seem to name the expression on his face. It fluctuates between disbelief and wonder. She wonders what it feels like to be on the other side of this equation. She pushes her hips further down and watches his head snap back. She smiles at the swell of power it causes deep in her chest.  
It’s not quite a struggle in the end. It does however adopt their typical push and pull. When one of her retaliations (for nipping a little too hard at her collar bone—she’ll wear the bruise for a week) brings him to orgasm she can’t quite contain her slightly breathless laugh. His low growl shuts her up, however. And his determination results in her joining him in post orgasmic bliss.  
It’s either the early light of morning or her bed mate’s stare that wakes her a few hours later. She opens her eyes to meet his and finds herself smiling slightly. Rintarō’s expression is soft, not quite happy but purely unguarded and that is almost better. When it begins to slip into pure dawning horror however she feels something lodge behind her chest.  
“What? Is something wrong?” She moves to sit up when he groans, full and desperate.  
“Daru is going to give us hell.” He mutters. And suddenly she knows that the expression is truly warranted.

7.334859  
Kurisu stares down at the small bundle in her arms. She hasn’t had much experience with babies and it’s making the whole holding this tiny new person experience into a slightly nerve wracking event. Yes, she can rattle off Piaget’s stages of development and can explain why their mirror neurons are integral in their learning processes, but really the last child that she held was her cousin when she was 10.  
She can feel the tiny flutter of a heart beat against her hand, and the tiny fingers curled against the edge of the pale blue blanket tempt her to prod gently and watch re-clasp around her own fingers, perfect miniatures of Nanako’s, now that Kurisu thinks about it.  
There is also the fact that this tiny creature is Daru’s. It’s rather mind boggling actually. The fact that the slightly perverted, hentai fanboy that she’s known for years now is a father. And his daughter’s going to have his hair. Though how Kurisu can tell from the barely there, brown fluff she doesn’t know. She glances up from Suzuha and watches the little girl’s parents—Nanako still tucked into a hospital bed with Daru watching her like a hawk, wrapped around her finger Kurisu thinks. He has been pretty much since he met her. And the way that Nanako smiles back at him says that the feeling has become deeply mutual. Though now it seems as though Daru’s got another red string wrapped around his hand. He keeps glancing in Suzuha’s direction, checking on her. Some primal force tracking the baby’s transfer from one set of adoptive family’s arms to the next.  
“May I?” Rintarō’s voice in her ear is quiet. She turns to face him, somehow unsurprised that he managed to sneak up behind her in a crowded hospital room. As she carefully transfers little Suzuha to his arms she sees something spark in his eyes. A combination of old pain, pride, and love. It’s been a long time since she’s seen that particular look. And then he glances up at her and smiles and it’s beautiful. She returns the smile and watches as he carefully cradles the baby to his chest. He brushes a finger against the little girl’s forehead. And suddenly Kurisu can see him, maybe a few years from now, holding another baby…  
Her stomach drops because though it’s been 7 years she’s not sure that she ever really thought that he’d stay. Not when she bought the ridiculously flower tea on their first date or when he held her after their first fight. She closes her eyes letting the feeling wash over her, heart racing and brain moving faster exploring this future that she suddenly can see with perfect clarity.  
“Kurisu?” The slightly worried tone of Mayuri’s question pulls her out of her reverie and she smiles at her friend.  
“I’m fine May,” she says and then turns her smile to Rintarō who is in the process of handing Suzuha back to her mother. When he turns back to her, he meets her gaze with a slight smile of his own.  
“To the future?” she asks grinning slightly as she offers her hand.


End file.
